With high blood pressure, high triglycerides, diabetes, and a lot of extra weight, Doreen Pelland’s doctor told her she was headed for a heart attack or stroke.

Pelland, 56, needed to do something drastic.

Pelland said she’d always been heavy, even as a child, and could never lose a significant amount of weight. She was wearing size 26 pants and taking 16 prescribed medications each morning and 15 each night.

Her doctor told her she might want to consider bariatric surgery for weight loss.

“I said ‘let me think about it,’” Pelland said.

She did think about it. A lot. She went to a Southcoast Hospitals Group weight loss seminar held at White’s of Westport and learned all about the surgery and her options.

Pelland, a nurse, had surgery on Oct. 16, 2012.

“I took the chance and I did it,” Pelland said.

Dr. Rayford Kruger, a bariatric surgeon and the medical director for the Southcoast Center for Weight Loss, performed the surgery.

“We’re becoming a leader in the region,” Kruger said.

The Center for Weight Loss, located at Tobey Hospital in Wareham, has performed more than 3,500 such procedures since the program was developed in 2004. The Center for Weight Loss serves the entire region as part of Southcoast Health System, which also runs Charlton Memorial Hospital in Fall River and St. Luke’s Hospital in New Bedford.

Kruger said new technology and research into weight loss procedures in recent years have caused a “dramatic reduction in serous complications and death” from surgeries. The statistics and risks currently, he said, are similar to gall bladder surgery.

Most procedures now are performed laparoscopically, rather than by open cut surgery. There are also more stringent patient screenings and ways of improving a patient’s health prior to surgery.

Issues such as smoking, heart disease, addiction, depression, and other diseases and conditions are all dealt with before a patient is cleared for surgery.

“It takes three to four months to get ready for surgery,” Kruger said.

The specific type of weight loss surgery is another consideration. Pelland had the “sleeve” surgery. In this type of surgery, a portion of the stomach is removed and a new “sleeve” or tube-shaped stomach is created. Intestines are not disturbed.

“The sleeve is not as anatomically disruptive,” Kruger said.

Surgeons also perform the gastric band or “lap band” laparoscopic procedure, in which a silicone band or ring is placed at the base of esophagus to make a smaller stomach pouch. Gov. Chris Christy of New Jersey became a national figure for weight loss surgery when he had the lap band procedure in February.

Gastric bypass surgery is another weight loss procedure. It creates a small pouch that bypasses the stomach and attaches to the intestines. It can be done traditionally or laparoscopically.

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Kruger said that for patients at risk of dying from heart disease, diabetes, or other serious illnesses, due to being overweight or obese, the benefits of surgery outweigh the risks.

He said patients have a nine-times higher incidence of dying from being obese, than from “choosing to do something about it.”

Pelland said the surgery saved her life.

Since she underwent the sleeve procedure in October, she’s lost 80 pounds and counting. Her triglycerides — up to 700 before surgery — are down to 210. Even her high blood pressure, which she’s had since she was 21, is better managed.

And the diabetes she’d been treating with pills since she was 48?

“I haven’t had diabetes since the day of surgery,” Pelland said. “It’s wonderful.”

Her pants size?

A 12. Close to a size 10.

“I’m stopping at 10,” Pelland said. “Now, I think my body is where it wants to be.”

Pelland said the surgery wasn’t very bad at all. She said she had some pain the day of surgery and was off pain medication on the third day.

Her stomach, which holds just 2 to 3 ounces of food, has changed the way she eats. At one time, food was of major importance in Pelland’s life, “not just the quality, but the quantity,” she admitted. Not any longer.

“Things that you really used to love don’t really taste good anymore,” Pelland said. “I used to love sweets. Now, I love vegetables.”

Pelland said she’s cut way down on her food intake, but doesn’t miss bigger portions.

“You learn to savor the taste of your food,” Pelland said. “It’s a life changer. Your old habits go away. You learn to eat sensibly.”

If Pelland has any problems at all these days, it’s how she’ll fit all her new clothes in her closet. She remembers looking at the new styles at Kohl’s and having to walk past them because they’d never fit. Now, she can buy anything she chooses.